A Bigger Jump
by tiggeryumyum
Summary: Once, twenty-two year old Daryl Dixon met fourteen year old Glenn.


Daryl's twenty-two when they put his pa in the ground, and Merle actually cries. Daryl doesn't know what to make of it.

He never liked his pa.

Never knew his pa.

He cut a dark, ominous figure in Daryl's childhood memories, a creature that spoke in angry, rumbling tones like the warning of distant thunder, crashing around their house like a hurricane when he got drunk enough. When Daryl got older, he was hardly ever there, showing very little interest in his youngest son. The strongest emotion Daryl had for the man was an uneasy fear - he was always relieved when the man's eye looked the other direction, when he left the house for weeks at a time.

The logical assumption was that Merle felt the same, but now he's sort of moping around like he's lost something and Daryl feels like he ought to do similar out of a sense of solidarity at least, but he doesn't know where he's supposed to look in himself for that, exactly. It's been bullied out of him.

There's this girl Merle's been staying with for the past few months, but after the funeral he seats himself in Daryl's passenger side without a word, and when they make it back to the old place, sits in Pa's old chair and sniffles.

Daryl pats Merle on the shoulder and volunteers to go for a smoke run, desperate to get out of there, to create some distance.

There's a specialty smoke shop in the strip mall right off the interstate in Hapesville and Daryl uses the excuse to drive all the way there for Merle's cheap ass Winstons, even though he could've stopped at any number of gas stations along the way.

He missed it on his way in to the shop, but on his way out the dark blue of a bulging backpack catches his eye.

The kid is sitting on the stoop and crying. Real quiet though, you'd have to be listening to hear it. Any other day Daryl would've kept right on going, but the last thing he wants is to play babysitter for a mopey Merle, even talking to a weepy stranger is better than that. 'Sides, the boy looks pretty out of his element. Maybe his parents forgot him there on a road trip or something. He'll need a ride to the police station, and if Daryl doesn't offer it, someone meaner and wronger probably will.

"Hey. Kid," Daryl says. Toes the kid's pack with his shoe.

He whips his head around, eyes wide with guilt, like Daryl's caught him with his hand in the cookie jar or up a neighbor girl's skirt.

Daryl couldn't tell with his head all bent forward, but now that he's looking at him, he can tell he's Japanese or Chinese or something.

As a young child, Daryl sort of thought there was only two types of people: blacks and whites. He'd heard about gooks and chinks, but they seemed like cartoon characters. He just assumed the real Asians he met once or twice were white like him - wasn't that much difference, really. He was in his preteens before he even connected the two, the Gooky Asian with a real live human being, and it's always been a point of embarrassment for him. He gets gruff and short around the subject and the people themselves, like they'll be able to tell, see it all when they look at him.

He's not sure why it bothers him, he doubts it's the kind of mistake that would give Merle a second's pause.

"Your parents around?"

"No," he says, looking down. "I, uhm, ran away."

Daryl snorts. "Yeah? Big man, then. Where you headed?"

"Atlanta," he says, sniffling in his snot, wiping at his face.

"Right, and how were you plannin on getting there? A wish and some snot?"

"No, I saved up." He holds up a wad of cash, just like that, and Daryl's amusement ends abruptly, he knocks the kid's hand out of his face, glancing around the parking lot as he does, making sure that the pile of bills didn't attract the attentions of one of the many nefarious assholes that crawl around this town, assholes like Merle who wouldn't think twice about knocking over some skinny run away just for the fun of it, let alone one that's fool enough to flash that kind of cash.

"Look - kid," Daryl says. Where the hell to start? "How old are you?"

His gaze shifts to the side. "Sixteen."

Daryl gives him another look. There's no way that's not a lie. He's fourteen at best. Daryl's been taught to keep his business to himself, to allow others to do the same, but this kid has his thumbs hooked through the straps of his backpack as he looks up at Daryl, toes kinda pointed toward each other in scuffed sneakers. Daryl was more or less living on his own at fourteen but this kid is a different kind of fourteen, sheltered and soft, the kind that obliviously shows a stranger all the money he has in the world, holding it out like an offer, not even making a tight fist around it.

"They hit you or somethin'?"

"What?"

"Your folks. They smack you around?" he knows the answer is no. Or maybe he's wrong. The kid's expression gets a little wet, and he stares out into the parking lot.

"No. But I can't go back home."

"What's stopping you?"

The kid looks at him, and it's this perfect heartbreaking expression, like Daryl's the naive one, like he's seen some great truth and he wants to keep from hurting Daryl with it. Then he gets up to walk away, and for some reason this panics Daryl - they aren't finished yet.

"Hey," he says. "What? Come on. It's bad enough to spook you out of your house but you can't even talk about it?"

"I can't - I can't tell anyone," he says. "It wasn't even my idea, I didn't want to tell anyone - "

He's standing there, shoulders lifting as his tears pick up again.

"What, you got into some trouble?" Daryl says, unimpressed. "Spray paint some wall? Break a window?"

"I - there was - this boy," he says. And there's no mistaking that, no that phrase, not in any language, the kid coulda been speaking Chinese and Daryl still would've know what _this boy_ meant. Everyone has it at least once in their life, _this boy_ or _this girl_. It's jarring, the sudden realization that this kid is a whole person, with all the urges and wants that come with it, that someone this young has any horse in this race, as gangly and awkward as his might be.

"I didn't want anyone to know," the kid keeps going. "but my - my dad found out, and he. He looked at me like," he looks at Daryl again, and his face falls in sobs. Daryl knows he's not exaggerating. He's seen the thing that Daryl's dad couldn't even work up the effort to afford him: hatred.

He's obviously thinking twice about telling Daryl this, eyeing him through his tears, like he's waiting for some kind of attack.

Daryl doesn't have the energy for it, frankly. It's been a long day. And lord a-fucking-bove, this kid is ridiculous in his harmlessness, hair fanning up in the wind, cheeks still a little rounded with baby fat. His t-shirt has some sort of cartoon animal on it. You'd have to be some kind of stupid or evil to hate him.

"Listen, kid, I put my old man in the ground not two hours ago - "

"I'm sorry," the kid says, looking aghast.

Daryl shakes his head. "The fucker didn't give two shits about me when he was alive, I ain't shedding any tears. The point is, I realized he wasn't worth the heat from his own shit when I was around your age, and it spared me a whole load of misery, then and now. So you got the same choice I did. Your old man's an asshole. He's gonna be an asshole no matter where you or what you do, even if you run off to Atlanta with nothin but a backpack of clean drawers and fucking half a month's rent. Only difference is you ain't gonna be robbed and left in a gutter with your folks. He kick you out or anything? Get out his gun?"

"No," the kid says quietly.

"Don't let him ruin your life, then. Go back to your folks. Don't let him scare you off 'til you're ready to go. Or close to it, anyway."

The kid frowns to himself, head down far enough for his chin to press against his neck. Daryl climbs to his feet, dusts off the backside of his jeans.

"There's a bus station four miles down. Stops off at Atlanta every day 'round four. I'll give you a ride if you still want it."

He ends up giving the kid a ride, but not to the station. Down a little suburban street, open yards with fresh, green squares of grass. Flower gardens and pinwheels. The house they stop at is smallish but neat, painted pale blue with red trim. What has to be the kid's ten speed bike is still leaning against the garage door.

The kid waits a moment with his hand on the knob, then turns and tries to meet Daryl's gaze. Daryl keeps looking forward.

"Thanks," he says.

Daryl grunts. Still, he watches, makes sure the kid makes it up the porch.

x

They stopped to give T-Dog's home a proper look when they passed it, then again at the Grime's old place. Seems like it's the thing they do now, and no one protests when Glenn mentions that his childhood home is just seven miles out.

It's Daryl, Glenn and Rick that head out, and Daryl is distracted, keeping an eye out for the general thickness of walkers in the area, he doesn't make the connection until they pull up – until they're right there, Glenn's in the passenger side when the neat little house comes into view. The blue is faded to an unhappy gray and the red isn't nearly as bright but it's enough to bring the memory zooming back into sharp, sharp focus. Suddenly he can see that child so thoroughly in Glenn he wonders how he ever missed it.

He can see the memory hitting Glenn just as sudden, hand on the knob just like it was all those years ago, but they just lock eyes for a moment, let it pass.

Rick agrees to keep watch outside while Glenn and Daryl head in.

It's just the kind of place Daryl imagined, both then and later, when he thought about what sort of hypothetical home little Glenn must've been raised in. Little glass teapots sit on display in the hall, sitting on little lacy doilies. Even with all the dust and a few eerie blood splatters on the walls, Daryl still feels too dirty for it, out of place.

Glenn moves slow through the dining room. A small kitchen, jam and a sticky butter knife still sitting on the table. Glenn stares at them, then at the dishes in the sink, at the dried old rag on the countertop. He doesn't seem lost in thought as much as just lost.

"So," Daryl says. "What'd you think your old man would make of you now? Killin' walkers, living off the land?"

Glenn shrugs. He's unsurprised, probably waiting for the topic to come up. He runs his hand over some glass figurines on the kitchen counter. "You were right. It didn't really matter where I was or what I did."

Daryl watches him careful and close now, like he would a coon or a bear or something else ornery he might be tracking. Something that could make a sudden move and become a threat, get the upper hand on him. Glenn _remembered_ what he said? Why?

"You probably saved my life, you know," Glenn says, smiling sad as he looks at the bits of paper still stuck to the fridge.

"Yeah, well. Doesn't take a genius to figure out a skinny fucking eight year old ain't gonna make it alone in Atlanta."

Glenn shakes his head. "My mom's aunt lived out there. She would've taken me in."

Daryl frowns. Waits for the rest.

"When she found out what happened she was all ready to, I don't know. Fix me? The whole - gay thing," Glenn says. "Before I talked to you it didn't even occur to me that there were anything I could do except run away. From myself, I mean." He shrugs self-consciously. "You're the first person I talked to that made me feel like I had a right to stand my ground."

Daryl's bow feels hot in his hand. He hardly said anything as profound as that, and he doesn't know what to think of the kid making it into something so much bigger.

He clears his throat, to say just that, or maybe just change the subject, but then Glenn's eyes go wide and his mouth tightens and he's chucking a glass rooster with all his might. Daryl whirls around and sees the the figurine smash into a walker's forehead, and the walker tip backward at the force of it.

"Mister McKay," Glenn says, looking sick as the walker struggles to get to his feet. "I used to shovel his walk."

Daryl grunts, and puts an arrow in his head.

"Thanks," Glenn says.

"It wasn't that big a deal!"

Glenn blinks at the outburst, and worse than looking confused, Daryl can see when he _gets it_, when he sees what Daryl's talking about. He shrugs, smiling a little sheepishly.

"That's the point," Glenn says. He rubs at his jeans, a nervous little twitch of his that Daryl's noticed. "Doesn't look like there's anything else to see here."

Daryl frowns, sure he's missing something but he can't bring himself to ask. They walk out, one after the other.


End file.
